Tale of a Badger Year One
by Julian Oto
Summary: follow Harry as he makes his through his first year at Hogwarts as a member of the Hufflepuff house.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or any of the characters J.K. Rowling does.

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><p>"Welcome, little badger, I know just where to put you" the sorting hat claimed before shouting "Hufflepuff!"<p>

A huge cheer went up from the Hufflepuff table along with polite clapping from both Ravenclaw and Gryffindor tables as Harry Potter got up of the stool and made his way over to his new housemates and took a seat next the two students he had made friends with earlier on the Hogwarts Express.

_**Flashback**_

_Harry Potter was wondering around king's Cross station looking around platform 9 and 3/4 after been dropped of by his uncle, when he felt drawn to a pillar in between platform 9 and 10. Wondering what was causing this feeling Harry made his may over to it and circled around it trying to find out what was causing this feeling. Soon realizing that it was only one side that he was feeling drawn to, he made his way closer and took a good look at the side of the pillar when someone accidently bumped into him rather hard sending him flying into the pillar. Harry braced himself for the impact with the pillar only to find himself impacting with the floor, looking up from the floor in confusion he saw that he had fallen through the pillar and was now on a platform he'd never seen before which had a big red steam engine on the tracks with Hogwarts Express in gold on its side._

_Harry picked himself up from the floor and looked back at where he had fallen through and pressed his hand against the wall only o watch it disappear through it._

_"Whoa." Harry said as he realized the entrance was hidden with magic just like Diagon Alley, but was still confused as to why he felt drawn to it. Deciding to forget about it for now he gathered up his things including Hedgwig's cage and made his way onto the train looking for somewhere to sit down, he passed a few compartments which already had students in them, he continued on until he found an empty compartment, opening the door and stepping inside and putting his trunk in the overhead racking he sat down with Hedwig at his side near the window. Figuring it would be a good time to get a bit of sleep Harry pulled down the blinds and settled himself in the seat and found himself drifting off to sleep._

_"Interesting."_

_Harry looked around for a source of the voice he just heard, but could only see darkness surrounding him._

_"You have such potential." it continued._

_"What do you mean?" Harry asked nervously, not liking that he couldn't see who was talking to him._

_"It's not yet time for you to know"_

_"Who are you? What do you want?" Harry asked_

_"You'll find out soon enough, but for now it's time to wake up! …. Little badger" the voice finished with a whisper._

_Harry Jerked awake form the strange dram falling out of his seat, startling the compartments newest occupants._

_"Are you ok?" asked a ginger haired female sitting near the door._

_"Err …. Yeah" Harry mumbled while getting back into his seat._

_"I'm Susan, and this is my friend Hannah." she said indicating to the other girl that was also sitting near the door._

_"Hi." Hannah said with a smile of her face._

_"I'm Harry, nice to meet you both."_

_"I hope you don't mind us joining you in here, but we got tired of looking for an empty compartment and you were asleep." Susan explained._

_"It's ok, don't' worry about it." Harry assured her._

"_So … are you two looking forwards to Hogwarts? Harry asked, hoping to break the ice and start a conversation with both Hannah and Susan._

_**End Flashback**_

Harry snapped back to reality when he saw the headmaster sat back down and food suddenly appeared on the table in front of them. While helping themself to plenty of food, Susan asked

"What do you make of the headmasters speech?"

"I don't think there's anything dangerous on the third floor; I mean imagine how much trouble he'd get into if a student got injured or worse." Harry Said "And no doubt your Aunt would be furious Susan."

Hannah snickered "That's an understatement."

"She's not that bad." Huffed Susan "She's just a firm believer in the justice system and doing things by the book as she says."

"What's it like? Having your Aunt working as the head of the DMLE?" asked Harry

"It's not too bad; she tries to be more of a friend than an Aunt." Susan explained

The conversation soon died down as Headmaster Dumbledore stood

"Now that we are all fed and watered, it's off to bed with you all."

"First years over here!" a seventh year with bright yellow hair shouted. "I'm Tonks, a Prefect for Hufflepuff, gather round me and I'll show you to the common room and dorms where you'll be sleeping during your time here."

Harry, Susan, Hannah and the rest of the first years gathered around the prefect and followed her as she lead them out of the Grand Hall. Along the way Tonks pointed out several routes they could take that would get them to the classes they would be taking this year and which would be the quickest. The first years gathered around Tonks when she stopped next to a blank section in the wall.

"Alright listen up, this here is the entrance to our common room, you will need a password to be able to enter. The password will change from time to time, when it does a notice will be posted on the notice board in the common room or if you've forgotten it you can ask a prefect"

Tonks then turned facing the wall and said "Unity"

Slowly a door started to appear where the empty wall once was. Following the prefect through the door the first years were eager to get their first look at their new home. The walls were a soft cream colour with a yellow floor; along the walls were numerous pictures of wizards, witches and some of various strange creatures Harry had never seen before. Throughout the room there was also; alcoves with tables for studying and more comfortable sofas for relaxing.

"Now, the first year boys dorms are on the left and the first floor going down and the girls dorms are on the right on the first floor going up, I'd recommend getting to sleep now as it's going to be a busy day for you all tomorrow, you will be getting you timetables at breakfast which will tell you what classes you have, when and who with." Tonks explained as she left to go to her dorm. After saying good night to both Susan and Hannah, Harry made his way to the first year boy's dorms. After finding his trunk and getting changed into his pyjamas he got into bed and couldn't help but think _'this is so much better than Stonewall High that his Aunt and Uncle wanted to send him to'._


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or any of the characters J.K. Rowling does.

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><p>Harry woke up feeling somewhat overjoyed, as he realised that for the time being he no longer had to listen to his Aunt screeching at him to make breakfast or having to listen to his Uncle grumble about one thing or another and no more Dudley. No more having to go out of the way to avoid him or running from him and his gang, he also realised that he could do his best in classes and didn't need to make it seem as if he wasn't as smart in fear of doing better than Dudley and what his Aunt and Uncle would say about it, as it was unlikely that they would ever read anything sent from the school be it a report card or otherwise especially after how they reacted to his Hogwarts letter arriving and Hagrid.<p>

With this in mind Harry finished getting ready for the day, filled with a new determination to do his best in classes and learn as much about magic as he could. Heading down stairs to the common room he saw the rest of the first years in the middle of the room talking to each other while the prefect from yesterday was standing nearby idly reading what seemed to be a magazine. Harry made his way over to where Susan and Hannah were talking with another first year boy,

"Morning Susan, Hannah," Harry said

"Morning Harry, this is Ernie." Hannah replied

"Potter" was all that Ernie said.

"Hi" Harry got the impression that Ernie wasn't that much of a morning person.

"All right now that you're all here I want to go other a few things before we head of for breakfast" Announced Tonks when she realized that all the first years were together.

"I recommend that that you travel to classes, to the library or anywhere else you're going in groups as unfortunately the other houses generally view Hufflepuff as full of weak people that are easy targets. Ravenclaw will generally leave you alone, Gryffindor and Slytherin are more often than not too busy with their house rivalry to make a fuss over us but that doesn't mean Slytherin's won't try and start something if they have the opportunity to. If anything does happen report it immediately to Professor Sprout our Head of House or to Professor McGonagall the Deputy Headmistress." Tonks explained.

"Now the Headmaster has decided that no classes will be held today so that all first years can settle in and get used to Hogwarts. So after we've been to breakfast and you've got your timetables for this year, I'll show you were you're lessons are and where the School library is."

Harry set of for the Grand Hall for breakfast along with his fellow first years when he realized than Tonks had different colored hair than when she did yesterday, now she was sporting a dark brown colored and he was sure it was longer as well. "Err, Tonks …." Harry asked timidly. "Didn't you have short, spiky hair yesterday?"

"Yep, I did, but I got bored of it and decided for a new look. What do you think?" Tonks asked.

"Huh ok I g-guess." Harry stuttered, not being used to asked by girls on how they looked.

"Only ok? … hhmm I'll have to try something else." Tonks said as she closed her eyes.

Harry could only watch in shock as Tonks hair suddenly grew until it was almost touching the floor and changed to the most shocking color of neon green. "What do you think now?" Tonks asked with a huge grin on her face.

"How did you do that?" Harry asked still shocked at the sudden change.

"I'm a Metamorphmagus, I can change my appearance any way I like, save's a lot of time and effort on a morning let me tell you."

"What class is it taught in?" Harry asked thinking how cool it would be to be able to do the same.

"Sorry it's not something that can be taught I'm afraid it's something you have to be born with." Tonks replied.

Harry was somewhat saddened to hear that but still asked Tonks how she realized she was capable of it.

"I was 10 when I first changed something and it was by accident, my mum bought me the most horrible looking dress that I changed my height, I spent the rest of the day walking around towering over my parents."

Harry sat down at the Hufflepuff table when they reached the Great Hall and was soon joined by Susan and Hannah along with Ernie and started eating. Harry found Ernie much more talkative as time went on and he'd woken up a bit more. Professor Sprout soon came round when they'd finished eating handing out time tables for the year to everyone. Looking at it Harry saw that tomorrow he had Charms first thing and the rest of the day was free.

"Right now that you all have your time tables I'll show you where about the classrooms are located and finish of at the library." Tonks explained after gathering up all the first years. They started off with the greenhouses that were outside before spending the next few hours going up and down the moving staircase to where they would be having various classes. With one hour left before lunch time Tonks showed them to the library.

Harry decided to spend the hour before lunch time looking for some extra books on his classes that would be helpful in understanding them better. Unsure as to where to start looking for them he approached Madam Pince the School Librarian. "Excuse me ma'am I'm looking for books that would help explain the school courses better, do you know where would be a good idea to start?" Harry asked.

Madam Pince looked up from where she was looking over some parchment. "Of course, you can find introductory level books on theory and practical at the begging of each row, the books cover more difficult material the further along the row you go. Each subject has a section of its own so they don't' get mixed up, when you find what you're looking for and would like to borrow it return to me and I'll book it out for you." Madam Pince explained.

Harry armed with this knowledge set of hunting for books on Charms, Potions, DADA, Herbology and Transfiguration that would hopefully give him a better insight into the subjects he would be studying. After spending almost 45 minutes searching through the numerous sections he had managed to find at least one book for each subject that explained the theory behind the subject a bit better and a few extra books, one on Runes and another on Enchanting that looked rather interesting Harry made his way over to Madam Pince so that she can book them out for him.

"Make sure that they are brought back in just as good condition, I don't want any doodling or tears in them. Is that understood?" Madam Pince asked while she booked them out.

"Yes ma'am." Harry assured the librarian as he collected his books and made his way back to the common room to make a start on reading some of his books so that he wasn't walking into any class knowing nothing on the subject. Once back in the comfort of the common room harry found an empty alcove and set his books on the table and pulled out the one on Charms to begin reading.

"Harry, its lunch time, aren't you coming?" asked Susan as she passed him before heading to the Great Hall.

"Hhmm? Oh no I'm fine thanks, I'm not really that hungry. See you when you get back." Harry stated while turning back to the book on Potions he was reading.

"Ok see you later"

Harry continued his studying until dinner time by which point he had read the first couple of chapters of each of the book and had a better understanding of magic in general than when he first walked through the front doors. Making his way to the Great Hall trailing behind a couple of older year Hufflepuff students, taking the warning that Tonks gave to heart, he found Susan and Hannah already at the table talking, he sat down next to Susan and started filling up his plate while asking Susan and Hannah what they had been up to the afternoon.

"We spent the afternoon exploring the school grounds outside." Hannah said

"You should have joined us Harry, it was quite fun."

"Maybe next time Susan. I wanted to do some reading on what we're going to be taught." Harry explained his absence. "Unfortunately a number of people, both adults and students are going to expect me to be really good at magic. At least that's the impression I got when I went to Diagon Alley to get my supplies With Hagrid."

"You do have a point, you know most are going to expect some miracle from you as The Boy Who Lived" Susan pointed out.

"Sucks to be you." Hannah replied.

Harry snorted in agreement while finishing off the last pieces of his meal, and making his way back to the common room with both Susan and Hannah following behind with the idea of doing a little more studying in preparation for their first class tomorrow morning.


End file.
